I wouldn’t swear to that last. I’ve definitely seen camping equipment in our local Tesco - I can’t be sure there was a tent there, but I can’t be sure there wasn’t. You can certainly get clothing, keep-fit equipment, TVs, computers, DVD players and much more - including a fairly big flatscreen TV last time I was in.
Our local Tesco is currently the largest Tesco store in the UK (yeah yeah, I know every town claims this, but this one is truly HUGE).
It’s well over 110,000sq ft, and genuinely rivals any of the French hypermarkets I’ve been to.
OK, I know that some of the bigger supermarkets have household goods etc., but have any of you Brits apart from me been to a Wal*Mart? They’re fucking mental. They sell the entire contents of Argos, in addition to groceries, all piled towards a 50’ ceiling, slapped up by forklifts.
I lived in England for a year, and the most noticable differences between US & UK supermarkets were:[ul][li]Much smaller carts[/li][li]No baggers–you had to do all the bagging yourself[/li][li]Much shorter hours. I was also surprised that (at least the big Tesco near me) was closed all day on Easter[/li][li]UHT milk (non-refrigerated, right off the shelf)[/li]No tortillas (except Taco Bell pre-made taco shells). When I asked the employees where I could find some, they had no clue what I was talking about. Flatbread? Naan? Not a problem. But tortillas? Uh-uh[/ul]
[QUOTE=ArchiveGuy]
[li]Much shorter hours. I was also surprised that (at least the big Tesco near me) was closed all day on Easter[/li][/QUOTE]
That has changed a lot in the last few years, with many supermarkets open 24 hours a day except for Sundays, when they’re limited to six hours (in practice, they also close earlier on Saturday and only resume 24-hour trading on Monday morning). That said, I got caught out this Easter Sunday when I went to Tesco and found that it was shut all day. Maybe different rules apply for that day.
The six hour limit on Sunday trading doesn’t apply everywhere in the UK - Scotland has more liberal opening hours (except for some of the Western Isles, but they’re weird), and I’ve heard that it’s more restrictive in Northern Ireland.
UHT milk is everywhere in the US now, although I think it did come to Europe first. Baggers are a regional or store-by-store thing. My three main Manhattan groceries bag for me, although it’s almost always the checker doing it rather than a separate person, but when I lived in the Bronx, I had to handle my own bagging.
I’ve been to a Walmart. The only noticeable difference between the Walmart I visited and our local Tesco is the size of the car park.
To the Brits who are stating camping equipment and the like cannot be purchased from a supermarket, where abouts are you living? In the city centre, or suburbs with huge retail parks?
Our local Asda and Tesco (both right next to each other, incidentally, with a Marks and Spencer’s there, too) sell everything from clothes, TVs, dishwashers, music, films, trampolines, sporting equipment etc. etc. The one in Wigan is even multi-storied, with escalators taking you upstairs.
Visited Britain once in 1992; made a point of visiting a couple outlets of Sainsbury’s, because I’m odd that way (when I travel I want to learn things like where you go for a newspaper and milk if you don’t have 7-11s. When I was in California a couple years ago I made a stop at a farmstand to learn if California strawberries are any good in California. They’re very good, it turns out.)
What I remember:
–Haggis and Scotch eggs in the meat case
–Pot noodles
–Lots of flavors of hot chocolate in single-serving packets
–Chocolate Horlick’s. Why the HELL isn’t that available here??
–Bovril. I know why that isn’t available here; it’s awful.
–A truly staggering variety of potato-chip flavors. Roast chicken. Steak and onion. Bacon. We Americans invented the damn things, and at that time we had to make do with plain and barbecue; even today salt and vinegar or Old Bay seasoning is about as wild as we get. Britain seemed to have every imaginable chip flavor except beer, and they may have that by now. Amazing ingenuity.
Yeh, like I said – Wal-Mart wasn’t the best store to mention – I know it’s a really strange phenom – actually the “super” Wal-Marts that have groceries as well as the department store stuff is a rip-off of the Fred Meyer stores from the Pacific NW. Sam Walton stole a great idea and ran with it. Oh, and the 1950’s picture I linked to was the only thing I could find that somewhat portrayed the idea I was talking about. Now, see the “village shop” mentioned in Hot Fuzz is really about the size of our local Kroger, but still has that retro feel to it. Am I making any sense? Oh, and our local Food Lion had tents just the other day. I’m just sayin’.
I do like the older BBC shows (Are You Being Served and Keeping Up Appearances most notably) and realise the difference in the older shows and the contemporary ones, believe it or not 
By the way, jjimm, it’s ok if you thought I was a dumb hick from TN, my own freaking cousins in Oregon thought that until they met me. They seriously thought I was going to be dressed in overalls, spitting into a cup and singing along with Bosephus – turned out, I was dressed all in black, with a mohawk listening to The Pogues and Black Flagg. Kind of like how someone will meet the store manager at my favourite $tarbucks, and say “wow, you have a British accent, have you ever met the queen?” Because, all we ‘merkins know that you Brits each get a birthday party with the Queen at least once in your life. No foolin’ us!
ArchiveGuy when you mentioned no tortillas, that reminded me of the strangest thing I encountered living in the PNW. In the South, there’s this stuff (you can buy it pre-packaged) called “Yellow Rice” it’s a very common side dish down here. In fact, it is what Indians and Asians call “Saffron Rice” – I could not find it anywhere in the PNW. Seriously, the only way I could have my yellow rice was to spend a freaking fortune buying saffron and then spice the rice on my own. How odd is that?
How about this as a comparison: the market in Cashback which was filmed in London, is that typical of UK food markets? It looks very much like the ones here in New England.
Really? Most people I know buy house brands as much as possible. They’re quite frequently better quality as well as less expensive. Half of them are from the same processing plants anyway. We’re also getting more ‘upscale’ house brands–I’ve noticed them particularly in cookies (because they make these yummy maple sandwich cookies, mmmmm).
I’ve beem to a Wal*mart in RI and thought it pretty neat.
However, the biggest fucking s/market I ever saw was in Michigan, the name was Meijer(sp) and the place was ginormous.
Plus I never met a nicer bunch of shop assistants than at that place
Yeah, but then it’s a bit retro for the UK too, which is pretty typical of a smaller supermarket in a small country town. The current business model wouldn’t build a supermarket there at all, but would find a larger site outside of town and nearer to major road links, that… oh, but I’m telling you the plot!
Slight hijack, but do the US supermarkets have the self-service checkouts like Tescos does in the UK? That is, you scan your own items and pay using either cash or credit/debit card. At my local Tescos they have six of these - two are full size checkouts (ie with conveyor belt) and four are designed for shoppers with the smaller baskets.
That’s becoming very common here. In my neighbourhood, three chains have them (Giant Eagle, Kroger and Meijer). However, my nearest supermarket is a Wal Mart, and they don’t have them (yet).
According to the bumph, that’s a Sainsbury’s, so unless it was a specially-built set, then it’ll be pretty representative.
But more to the point - Keeley Hazell and a bunch of other hotties, naked in a supermarket… why the hell have I never heard of this movie?! :mad: My DVD player’s broken too. :mad: :mad:
It would have been against the law for them to open on Easter Sunday, don’t want to upset the Christians.
**Aldi **anybody?
Best. Shopping. Ever.
Every Aldi store is basically layed out in the same configuration, and with the limited brands and lack of garish bling/music/advertising, it actually makes for a really relaxed shopping experience.
sandra_nz, although Giles already answered you – I will add that the Wal-Marts in my area have a crapload of the self-checkouts now. Personally, I have noticed that one store will deliberately understaff the checkouts so that customers are forced to use the self-checkout lanes – the other store tends to have nicer employees/management, and doesn’t seem to ever be understaffed.
WotNot – hahaha, actually, that was not the plot. All those people were killed for other reasons. 